Sharnika Brown said James Junior Minter looked her in the eyes Sunday morning on the front row of Oasis Tabernacle Church and told her, “I got to kill you.”

Seconds later, Minter allegedly opened fire, shooting Brown, their one-month-old son, Jamieyon, and assistant pastor Bob Carswell.

“I’ve never seen that look on his face, never,” Brown said.

Minter was arrested and charged with three counts of attempted murder. He’s being held on $3 million bond at the Dallas County Jail awaiting a preliminary hearing Nov. 3.

Brown, her son and Carswell were rushed to hospitals in Birmingham and Selma. Carswell and Brown were released from the hospital Sunday, but Jamieyon was kept overnight in Birmingham after undergoing surgery on his hand to save his fingers.

Brown said doctors at UAB Hospital were able to save her son’s fingers, and he is expected to go back in a few weeks for a check up.

Brown, who had been with Minter off and on for 10 years, said Sunday wasn’t the first time he pulled a gun on her, and he has a history of domestic violence.

Brown said there were times she wanted to leave, but she didn’t.

“I stayed because I loved him, and I thought with me loving him hard enough that he would have seen it and wanted a future together,” Brown said.

Brown thought Minter might change when Jamieyon was born, but an argument over money made her realize she needed to leave. She said Minter got violent during the argument, jumping on her back with Jamieyon in her arms.

Brown moved in with her father and stepmother, and days later she said Minter told her he wanted another chance, but she refused to go back until he changed.

“That Saturday morning I got a phone call saying he went in my house and took up everything I had in my house. He cut up couches and the bed, all of my baby’s belongings,” Brown said.

The next day it happened.

“When we walked through the doors of the church his car pulled up in a rage. He stopped on the dime, and [wearing] the clothes he had on I knew he wasn’t coming for the church,” Brown said.

“The pastor was praying as we walked through the doors, and we stood there waiting until the pastor got through praying. That whole time he was standing behind us. He could have killed my whole family.”

Brown said she usually sits in the back, but something didn’t feel right to her stepmother.

“When I sat down my stepmother said, ‘Tink, I don’t feel right. Come sit on the front pew,’” Brown recalled, adding she then sat on the front pew with Jamieyon beside her.

“He came behind me. He moved my baby, put my baby on the side, and he got between us,” Brown said.

Brown said that’s when Minter said he had to kill her.

“He looked at my baby, turned around and looked at me with tears in his eyes. I felt like he was serious, so in the midst of that I threw my hand over the pew and signaled my dad that he’s got a gun,” Brown said. “I sat there, and my dad jumped up and said, ‘We’re in the house of the Lord, and this man’s got a gun.’”

Brown said Minter jumped up and pulled the trigger, but the gun jammed.

“He had enough time to make his mind up to get out of the church when the gun jammed. He came there to do what he had to do,” she said. “He unjammed the gun leaned over the pastor [and] shot me. He turned the gun toward my baby [and] shot at my baby’s car seat two times, and after he shot that way, it was just shooting.”

Campbell, who was sitting behind his daughter, said he didn’t recall how, but he ended up on the front row wrestling Minter to the ground.

“I don’t know how in the world I got to him. All I know is that I can’t let this man kill my daughter,” Campbell said.

“Everything was dark, but when I come back to reality I had the barrel of the gun pinned to the floor and him down, so he can’t pull his hand out, can’t move the gun. That’s all I could do.”

Minter eventually let go of the gun and escaped the church, only to be caught by police.

Brown said it will take time to get over Sunday, but she is thankful to be a live and thankful to everyone saying prayers for her and Jamieyon.

“I felt like it was going to get worse, but I wouldn’t have thought it would have been this way at a church where it is supposed to be the safest place in the world,” Brown said. “It still doesn’t feel real.”

Campbell said the only way to go from here is forward.

“I know it is going to take some time to get past this,” he said.

“It is nothing you can forget about right away, but we’re together, and we pray together, and we’re going to get through this together.”